Media is pervasive in our society. People encounter media broadcast over traditional AM and FM formats as well as satellite radio and internet radio streams. Digital audio players, such as the Apple iPod™, allow people to bring their entire music library with them and listen to it virtually anywhere. Other electronic devices allow for songs, movies, audio books, and other media to be consumed in any format and any location. Consuming media in new locations brings new problems. For example, a person driving while listening to an mp3 player connected via Bluetooth to a car stereo is unable to view the display of the mp3 player while driving, at least not safely, to see who is performing the song or the name of the song. Similarly, music streamed to an XM satellite receiver can be brought out in the yard while gardening so the person listening cannot see the display. Bringing media to new locations means that often a listener is unable to quickly or safely determine information about a particular song that is playing.
The problem of not knowing what song or video clip is playing is addressed partially by live Disk Jockeys, or DJs. A live DJ announces selected information about one or more songs before or after playback. One of the problems with live DJs is that listeners never know when the next DJ announcement will be, so it is unsuitable for listeners who have a short attention span or are unable to focus their memory and wait until the next DJ announcement; that is, live DJs cannot provide on-demand information about a particular song to a user. Another problem with live DJs is that not every song is announced or not all available data about the song is announced. Often a live DJ will simply state the artist and song name, neglecting to mention other information, such as the album, the release date, chart ranking, to say nothing of individual user rankings which are completely beyond the scope of a live DJ to provide for each, individual listener.
These problems also exist to some extent for blind or visually impaired listeners. A blind listener has no way to read the metadata on a screen even if it were displayed.
Radio stations often have contractual obligations to announce song information a certain, minimum number of times. Live DJs are imperfect people and may forget or refuse to announce at the contractually designated level, exposing their employers to contractual liability.
Accordingly, what is needed in the art is a way to identify information about media content without distracting the listener's attention unnecessarily.